Someday World (CD)

Brian Eno
, Karl Hyde

Amoeba Review

05/05/2014

Yes, that Eno. The Hyde is Karl Hyde of techno-interfacing avant-pop stalwarts Underworld and the rest of the band is culled variously from Coldplay, Roxy Music, and the Eno family tree, among other places. The music here is generally upbeat, scattering polyrhythmic persistence in the form of standardized 16th-notes, interrupting each other at various speeds and intervals, occasionally fomenting something like urban white-guy highlife with rich candied frostings of Mario Kart exuberance and oily texture. Critics and listeners will be hard on this album and they should be. We know what to expect from Eno & Hyde on their own and our demand for exceptional material in collaboration isn't unreasonable. Casually, without looking in or directing, that demand is met. The music is exceptionally intricate and pleasant without becoming opaque or obtuse in the way that both musician's electronics-powered sound-walls can become. That is to say, this is decidedly and transparently human music. The musical references of the staccato dancing guitar music of Africa are pervasive, and the record is as much electronically textured as it is driven by what a guitar can do and what a guitar can do when a human plays it. This is rhythm guitar not in the sense that it lays the ground for a solo but in the sense that a guitar is a rhythm instrument, a kind of overly complicated tonal hand drum that can keep pace as well as anything else. Fans of both Eno & Hyde should find things to both contemplate and enjoy on this release.